Saving the earth one home at a time

Championing clean cooking in the countryside thru innovation  

April 22, 2020

Cooking is a basic life skill we all need for survival. But while we have been too focused on learning the techniques of preparing a dish, an activity many of us may be enjoying this quarantine, we have set aside a pressing related matter that we should have tackled ages ago: the environmental and health problems that cooking steams off. 

Modern clean cooking technologies still remain out of reach to three billion people, mostly in developing countries, who continue to depend on open fires or traditional stoves paired with low-cost dirty fuels for their daily meals. Such tools contribute to the emission of high levels of carbon monoxide, killing every year nearly 4 million people or 7% of total global mortality, according to the World Health Organization.

As many rural folks in the Philippines still cook using biomass fuel such as wood, corn cobs, coconut shell, animal manure, rice hull, sugar cane bagasse and crop residue, among others, Bataan Peninsula State University (BPSU) Researcher Engineer Jonathan E. Lacayanga saw the need for at least an improved way to burn them efficiently and contribute less to air pollution in households. The widely used open fire stove locally known as tungko is a dangerous and inefficient way to burn biomass fuel, owing to its requirement of a huge amount of biomass materials for the slow heating of a small portion. 

Lacayanga then led a team of researchers at BPSU to develop a clean cook stove that consumes minimal fuel and emits less smoke.

“The motivation behind the development of this stove was to replace the three-stone stove or tungko, which is known to be dirty, inefficient and consumes much wood for cooking and heating. This is part of our broader push for the wide-scale adoption of clean cooking practices, policies and investments to fight indoor air pollution,” said Lacayanga.

The “Vertical-Fed Biomass Cookstove”

Named by the BPSU as the “Vertical-Fed Biomass Cookstove,” the cookstove has a hollow body that can be filled with water which can trap the fine particulate matter (PM) that gets out of the chimney-like pipe during operation, allowing it to emit less smoke and reducing the polluting particles the smoke emits.

About 420 units have been distributed to different households as part of the testing phase. 

The cost of the stove ranges from P500 to P1,500 depending on the size and materials used for fabrication. Mass production can also be a factor to further reduce the cost per unit, according to Lacayanga.

Entering foreign markets

To begin the commercialization process, BPSU secured a utility model (UM) for the stove in 2012. The UM has expired but Lacayanga and his team are working on several improvements to the stove based on feedback of initial users and regular monitoring of the needs and living conditions of targeted users. 

While these iterations have yet to materialize and be protected again through the IP system, BPSU had applied for a trademark for the stove to somehow secure a level of protection as the team sets sights on markets abroad.

“We have interested parties and ongoing collaboration with a manufacturing firm in India on the promotion, production and commercialization of our cook stove in the Indian market. We have a similar collaboration in Ghana and Kenya which we hope will allow us to soon penetrate the African markets. And on top of all these, BURN Design Lab, a US based testing institution, is in progress in testing if the stove meets international standards,” Lacayanga said. 

The project has been presented in several local and international fora such as in Cambodia, India, and China. The impact of the invention on rural cooking in developing countries has been recognized by the Clean Cooking Alliance, a public-private partnership initiated by the United Nations Foundation,  making BPSU one of over a thousand institutions in the world belonging to the Alliance.

Lacayanga admits that to this day, nearly a decade since the BPSU’s clean cooking breakthrough, the awareness campaign on the negative effects of inefficient cookstove to health and the environment remain low.

“Moving forward, we plan to do more intensive promotion campaigns for our invention and our advocacy and do so in collaboration with partners here and abroad who work on health, environment, and the welfare of women and children. As such, protecting our intellectual property right is a necessary move in protecting our innovations especially as we move around the world,” Lacayanga said. 

IPOPHL supports BPSU

Intellectual Property Office of the Philippines (IPOPHL) Director General Rowel S. Barba lauded the BPSU's innovation and its dedication to distribute their clean cooking solutions to biomass dependent households particularly in developing countries.

“When it comes to collective efforts in saving the earth, we always look at the bigger landscapes that need saving — the oceans, the forests, the wildlife, our river — that sometimes we forget fixing the pollution and waste problems at home,” the IPOPHL chief said. 

"For this, the BPSU is highly commendable for its innovative work in improving living conditions in the countryside while contributing to the global fight against air pollution," Barba added. 

This April, the country is celebrating IP Month with the theme “Driving Eco-Innovation through Intellectual Property” in recognition of the sufferings of Nature and the power of the IP system in stimulating innovations that can protect what the earth has been left with.